Seeing Justice

In Seeing Justice, Mary Angela Bock studies the way the American criminal justice system is visually represented in news. Going behind the scenes, she examines the way visual journalists negotiate with police and court officials to cover the criminal justice system, and how officials endeavour to create favourable narratives by controlling what the public sees.

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A behind-the-scenes look at the struggles between visual journalists and officials over what the public sees--and therefore much of what the public knows--of the criminal justice system.

In the contexts of crime, social justice, and the law, nothing in visual media is as it seems. In today's mediated social world, visual communication has shifted to a democratic sphere that has significantly changed the way we understand and use images as evidence. In Seeing Justice, Mary Angela Bock examines the way criminal justice in the US is presented in visual media by focusing on the grounded practices of visual journalists in relationship with law enforcement. Drawing upon extended interviews, participant observation, contemporary court cases, and critical discourse analysis, Bock provides a detailed examination of the way digitization is altering the relationships between media, consumers, and the criminal justice system. From tabloid coverage of the last public hanging in the US to Karen-shaming videos, from mug shots to perp walks, she focuses on the practical struggles between journalists, police, and court officials to control the way images influence their resulting narratives. Revealing the way powerful interests shape what the public sees, Seeing Justice offers a model for understanding how images are used in news narrative.